In a previous article, we look at Wales’s kit history with Lotto and the oddities that that threw up.
The move to another Italian supplier, Kappa, in 2000, didn’t really bring an end to such inconsistencies. In fact, the first Kappa home shirt was a stop-gap that was worn for just two games.
September 2000 brought the launch of the ‘proper’ home and away kits, with white home shorts making a return. The change strip was a reversal of that while a third kit was marketed too, with blue featuring for the first time on a Wales shirt.
This kit received only one outing, in a scoreless friendly at home to the Czech Republic in March 2002. Later that year, however, another yellow strip would be used.
Croatia can be tricky opponents for countries who wear red or white first kits, as the other colour is often the backup.
Wales travelled to Varazdin for a friendly in August 2002 and the yellow and blue strip might have been expected to be on show, but instead an all-yellow strip – in a paler shade, like the ‘daffodil yellow’ of the Admiral era – was worn.
Croatia had a lot of blue on their kit at the time so that was a possible reason for the different strip, or it could just have been that Wales had a new set of kits for 2002-03 and the yellow and blue was out of production and this was knocked up at short notice.
As with its predecessor, it was only worn once but it is regarded as being even rarer as it never went on sale as a replica. Adding to its cachet is the fact that Simon Davies’ goal in the 1-1 draw was so good.
In 2003, a new blue third strip was launched but, as Wales were able to wear red in all of their Euro 2004 qualifiers, neither it nor the white away kit were ever worn by the senior team.
